The present invention relates to tables facilitating formation of heated glass according to a flat pattern.
Bending of heated glass for various purposes is a highly skilled trade. This is especially true for example in the neon sign producing industry. There, exacting flat patterns are precisely followed by a highly skilled tube lender. The bending process begins with a straight piece of glass tubing, heated at selected areas where bends are to be formed. The glass tubing must be heated until it is sufficiently flexible enough to allow formation of the necessary bend. The tube bender makes the appropriate bend and places the tube on the pattern to assure that the bend was properly made. These steps are repeated until the project is complete.
Because of the elevated temperature of the heated tube, the patterns have had to be made from a heat resistant material. Asbestos paper has been in predominant use by tube benders for this purpose. Asbestos, however, is now commonly known to cause asbestosis, a disease that has severely affected the tube bending trade. In fact, legislation has been recently passed forbidding the sale of asbestos. No more asbestos paper can now be produced.
Patterns made on ordinary paper are useful (if at all) only once due to burn marks left on the paper surface by heated glass. Other alternatives to ordinary paper are either impractical or too expensive.
The problem now confronted by the neon sign industry and others using bent glass is how to preserve forming patterns for future reuse.
The present invention provides a table on which ordinary paper patterns can be used. The patterns are insulated from the heated glass on a table structure presenting a surface for support of formed, heated glass. The pattern is not subjected to either heat or frictional wear and will therefore last at least as long as previously used asbestos paper, without any health hazard to the tube bender. Additionally, the heated glass is supported on a surface of the table that will not substantially conduct heat from the heated glass, thereby allowing even, uniform cooling of the hot tubing sections.